Yeah, whoever was doing that seems to know his stuff. But hanging out here on the ZZ makes us a little er, sceptical of extraordinary claims. If Tarzan says those are his hands and his skillz, that would go a long way to fend off any cynics. Then we might find out how this skill can be useful...

Here are some more statements from the expert today and what was not mentioned (because he cannot): "DMHE material uses linear approach with side counts. Tarzan uses a non-linear approach to using the same data." Why is nonlinear automatically better? "It is much more accurate in general." How much more accurate? "The BC, PE and IC metrics are for linear approaches. Only the IC metric shows the true max at 1.0. Tarzan's BC is probably very close to .98 or maybe higher." Again, how much higher? 200%? "His PE is probably in the .90's." All you can say is "probably"? "The max PE for a linear count with no side counts is .70 but with side counts the PE can get much higher." How much higher? 300%? "Using ratios for 3 or more card groups instead of a linear aproach raises the PE ceiling even more." How much more? To heaven? "Think of the difference between knowing there are 5 more low cards played than high cards, and knowing there are also this many surplus or deficit of these middle ranks and there are 5 surplus aces with an equal number of T's to lows but not many middle cards and there are a lot more 8,9 than 6,7" You group 6-9 together. How can you know there are more 8,9 than 6,7?

That is indeed a most amazing "count system", even DS was left rather speechless.

CP

DS just spoke:

"You may not agree, but it really doesn't matter. Compared to a computer simulation, all the aspects you discuss, and one's entire lifetime of play, is nothing more than a blip on the computer screen. One or two standard deviations of the "superior" manner of playing, compared to the more "simplistic" manner, in all likelihood, wipes out the entire difference. In more brief terms, better lucky than good.

I have absolutely nothing against people who keep 42 side counts in their head, with a level-62 count (:-)); rather, my objection comes when those people continually explain to us how much more money they're winning over their lifetimes from all this extra effort. It makes most others who read think that the endeavor is worth the trouble, and I don't believe that this is the case. Hence, the Illustrious 18, Norm's REKO, and other attempts to permit counters to play their system perfectly accurately and with ease. And, finally, hence the utter bullshit that was James Grosjean's consummate nonsense in his Exhibit CAA, in regard to the above."

"You may not agree, but it really doesn't matter. Compared to a computer simulation, all the aspects you discuss, and one's entire lifetime of play, is nothing more than a blip on the computer screen. One or two standard deviations of the "superior" manner of playing, compared to the more "simplistic" manner, in all likelihood, wipes out the entire difference. In more brief terms, better lucky than good.

I have absolutely nothing against people who keep 42 side counts in their head, with a level-62 count (:-)); rather, my objection comes when those people continually explain to us how much more money they're winning over their lifetimes from all this extra effort. It makes most others who read think that the endeavor is worth the trouble, and I don't believe that this is the case. Hence, the Illustrious 18, Norm's REKO, and other attempts to permit counters to play their system perfectly accurately and with ease. And, finally, hence the utter bullshit that was James Grosjean's consummate nonsense in his Exhibit CAA, in regard to the above."

Wow!!, I missed that post by Don! I wondered how long he would sit silent, thought old age had caught up with him.

CP

I bet you saw this one from DS regarding the fancy non-linear count:

"So, I repeat: If you play a system with which you claim to win 10% more than simple Hi-Lo (you have never stated what you think your advanced system is worth in improvement), and you get unlucky and lose one s.d., you won't win any more than the Hi-Lo guy with average luck, and you'll win LESS than the Hi-Lo guy with good luck.

"I messed the entire thing up anyway. It was easier to delete than fix. I was going to quantify the amount Don specified, 1 or 2 SD's in a lifetime of play. Ignore the entire thing."

Hmmm, I wonder how many of his nearly 7000 posts were messed up? Delete them all? That's quite some work!

Lady Tthree was always fond of boasting how high his IQ level is (Mensa?) and that other mere mortals always have trouble understanding what he is on about, because of his way-superior, genius-level intellect. I wonder how many times he mentioned those points, in his 7000 posts. Let me take a guess... a conservative ten% makes it 700 posts, looks pretty close.

Last edited by Katz; September 8th, 2014 at 09:57 PM.
Reason: She's a genius

I am in the process of putting the whole system into an easy enough to understand format, the official "how to" manual of this.

There's an important point that Arnold Snyder made in his article about utilization of the information. The additional information from side counts is useless unless it is properly utilized in your calculations of your betting and playing strategies. Something I sought out long ago, right from the beginning was to achieve maximum utilization of information. Where other counts have about 20 points of reference between -10 to +10 I have 330 unique points of reference over that same span. These specific "fingerprints" of deck composition match up against a memorized chart(s) for each hand, providing maximum utilization of the information derived from the DHME style groupings. I seriously question how many people may ever learn it though.

There is in fact a certain sense of pride in having a playing efficiency that is as close to a computer using perfect play as it gets. I attribute my methods and tactics to my overall success over the years but there may be those that may claim that I am nothing more than a lucky slob that happens to be sitting on the happier side of the bell curve, a valid topic so who knows...

I checked out the info you posted on the other forum and followed the examples that you gave. It's seems like it's a very difficult system to use. I wasn't sure what tag values were assigned to each grouping but your post clarified that up. It almost makes me think that a level 2, 3, or 4 system would be easier to learn since a player only has to hold one value in their head besides for the values of 4 different groupings.

With a SD I can add up the total to the first 3 groupings with no problem seeing a 4 hand spread. The hard part is carrying the values of the 3 groupings in my head to the next round, and then counting up the second rounds hands. The .3 really slows things down. If I was going to commit to learning the system you use I would probably work with a SD and only add the aces when I can successfully count up the first 3 groupings with no errors. Where I count up the 2-5 grouping with the 6-9 grouping, then flip flop and count up the tens grouping with the 6-9 grouping, and then eventually combine all three groupings to where I add the aces. That would take a lot of work.

Tthree

I have played side by side with many AP's using many counts, including advanced 2nd level counts, I have never seen any difference in performance versus my HI-LO and my variations,, and on DD my HI-LO-LO always rocked, taking a back seat to no one.

When one throws STing into the equation, and I thank Maz and Bojack for their influencing me in this area, the game surely takes on a greater +ev than any multi level count can achieve.

I think the reason I missed DS posts was because I became so bored with the thread, and realizing it was all pipe-dreams, that I just quit reading it at some point. Glad DS stepped up.